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Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Life - Litter

Life - Litter

I was playing video games in my living room when a group of six teenage boys walked down the sidewalk past. They're loud and laughing, telling jokes in the rain as they pass by, when I hear a clatter.

I look outside. Over the headset microphone, several of my squad-mates ask what that sound was.  The boys have tossed two cans onto the walkway of our house. Still laughing, they start walking away.

I am seized by something. I put the controller down, pop the headset off and immediately stand up. Before I can even fathom the movement, I have thrown the lock on my front door and am standing out on my own steps.

I roar. In the voice I only use to call above the din of concerts and into fly galleries. In a voice I only use for theatre to carry several stories up or over loud music.

I am angry. My roar carries across the street up and down the avenue.

You damn kids! Come back here and pick that up!

They stop, hesitate, two of them make to keep walking.

Is that what you are going to do? Walk away? You think people don't see? We don't notice? Well I saw. I saw exactly what you did! Now come back here and pick up your damn trash off my property! Right Now!

One boy shuffles back, his head bowed low. He stoops into the grass and grabs the cans, then flees back to the group of them.

I see my neighbours across the street peek out from their windows. I see a lady and her toddler across the street pause to watch the whole thing.

I shut the door. Exhale.

I put on the headset and pick the controller back up.


Sunday, April 19, 2015

Writing - Rynyalla: Kanilay In The Dark

Writing - Rynyalla: Kanilay In The Dark

If darkness was a lover then it was one she knew well. Coiled and shifting, it wreathed its way around her, holding fast as the unearthly ship’s prow plunged onwards. Behind her, the crew moved with an unflinching accuracy, even in the pitch of unnatural night. The creak of sinuous rope and the buckle and grate of bone beneath the feet were the only sounds to accompany the slow lap of waves beneath.

In the distance glittered the jewel of the Eastern world. Myrefall. Ships fled their approach, tacking hurriedly and dashing away across the waters, fleeing for some safe harbour. There were no such places. Her fleet arrayed out behind her, a mental command as the rows of ships fell into formation.

The thump of booted feet approached behind her. A minotaur guard, clad in dull green platemail, his seven foot frame of rippling muscle bent in subjugation. “My lady. Landfall approaches.”

She waves one hand dismissively, he retreats. Clearly she can see beyond sight the city, even with the mask adorning her face. Instead, she raises a finger as though to hush the darkness...and speaks.

“Cull the city. Bring me the tribute that our lady seeks.”

Waves crash, and bodies groan, and the fleet pushes forward.

And Kanilay waits in the dark.

Thursday, April 16, 2015

Endless Horizons: Flatline - Texting

Endless Horizons: Flatline - Texting

The rack spun up in the dark. Mechanical processor started whirring, lights clipped on and the temperature rose by a degree. Flatline was sleeping, face down in the synth-cotton sheets. RAM spun and binary drifted. GUIN worked in the nanosecond spaces between nowhere and nothing.

The young hacker stirred, his eyes half open. Oculars and the synth jacks didn’t kick in yet, awaiting a mental command he never sent. Instead he lay awake, between awareness and not, half listening to the sound of electronics.

The myriad of terminals were sending a twist of digital code as they folded in on themselves again and again. On one console though there was the slow play of text unfolding, into a plain-char document that sat on a scratch-tunnel drive waiting to be uploaded to his wafer.

GUIN was writing something there, writing and erasing and writing again. Paragraphs appeared in an instant, the indicator dancing like wildfire down the page, before erasing it back again into missing digital particulate.

Over and over it happened, as he watched mesmerized.

The minutes ran into an hour, another.

Until the pulse of twisting text became just a single, simple sentence.

“Who am I?”

He closed his eyes.